Because size matters when it comes to statistics, [Will Prowse] decided to not just bank on his handful of failed Battle Born LFP batteries when it came to documenting their failure modes. Instead he got a whole gaggle of them from a viewer who had experienced failures with their Battle Born LFP batteries for an autopsy, adding a total of 15 samples to the data set.
Interestingly, the symptoms of these dead batteries are all over the place, from a refusal to charge, some have the overheating terminal, some do not show any sign of life, others have charged cells but a non-responsive BMS, etc. As [Will] notes, it’s important to test batteries with a load and a charger to determine whether they are functional not just whether you can measure a charge.
Although some of the batteries still showed enough signs of life to be put aside for some load testing, the remaining ones were cut open to check their insides. This revealed the typical molten plastic at the terminals, but also a lot of very loose connections for the internal wiring. Another battery showed signs of corrosion inside, which could be due to either moisture intrusion or a cell having leaked its electrolyte.
While the full results will hopefully be released soon, the worrying thing about this latest batch of Battle Born LFP batteries is that they span quite a few years, with one being from 2018. Although it’s comforting that not every one of these batteries is necessarily going to catch on fire within its approximate 8-year lifespan, a lot seems to depend on exactly how you load and charge them, as [Will] is trying to figure out with the upcoming load testing. With the unit that he recently purchased for testing it turned out that lower currents actually made the melting problem much worse.
Between this video and the much awaited follow-up, [Will] actually got his hands on a troubled 300A-rated industrial Battle Born battery. During testing that one actually failed violently with a cell venting and the loose BMS rattling around in the case.
Their marketing dept should rename the brand “Battle Burned”, that would be an honest take. How come this company is still in business ?
“Battle born” is another way of saying “field expedient”, which basically means the same as “jerry rigged”.
Should have read the label.
FWIW, “Battle Born” comes from the Nevada State motto. It’s the “Battle born state”. Lots of businesses there incorporate the term Battle Born into their names…
I buy Trust Fire batteries, I can always Trust them to start my camp Fire.
by the looks of the internal construction, those “batteries” certanly would give UL the shivers. wcgw joining copper bars with plastics in between.
Darnit that was meant to be a reply to Iman about brand names.
These batteries are WAY over priced anyway. Kudos to Will for calling them out. And BB keeps doubling down on their response.
Probably the same way Auto Makers are still in business when they sell hundreds of thousands of cars a year and a few dozen are duds.
Battle Born will fade away in the near future, they have screwed too many customers over in not honoring the warranty on these defective batteries. Only a matter of time until they disappear 🤣
Rumor has it : Not much longer according to the tea leaves on the DIY SOLAR site
Managing to find a way for LFP batteries to still be a fire hazard.
Good job Battleborn.
I have always been highly amused by that brand… Putting an icon of a fire on classic non-LFP lithium cells…
So one of the loose connections is flagged as a “thermal cutout” by the company. Given the multitude of OTHER loose connections, I’m calling BS on that claim.
I find it difficult to understand how they could double down for years on a proven bad design using sloppy assembly practices. It doesn’t seem that it would cost that much to correct the design flaws – I would think they could even replace those plastic bus spacers with FR4 and otherwise use the existing design.
Combining a better-but-still-cost-effective design with proper assembly – such as bolts torqued to a proper and consistent specs – would result in much more reliable batteries. I’m not sure how much it would cost to use better BMS boards, but I suspect the reputational damage of NOT using them is costing them more.
At least they seem to be using good-quality cells. It’s too bad the quality is wasted on poor design and sloppy assembly.
I this case, it seems like the Battle Born design is pretty bad. In material science, plastic literally means it can be deformed permanently and they’re clamping a thick section of plastic in the high current electrical sections. You get a little plastic creep, the connections get worse, which makes them hotter, which makes the creep worse, which makes the connections worse….
Aaaaahhhhh, threaded commenting is broken……
Indeed. Will try to fix. Comment system on the fritz.
Sounds like one of those companies where the CEO keeps a skeleton crew without trained designers or engineers to minimize cost – only enough people to make the product and ship it, and nobody who really understands what they’re doing. The company has what amounts to a proof of concept or an early prototype of a product and no human resources to develop it further. That usually happens when the CEO is an “ideas guy” who expects to just get everything by outsourcing and offloading the details to someone else while they’re “doing business”.
The reason why they won’t change the design even after customers complain is because they literally can’t. The CEO would have to hire some competent person to do it, and keep that person on the payroll. Every such applicant just walks out after seeing how they’re running the shop.
Dragonfly Energy, the company that makes the Battle Born LFP batteries, claims on their website that “each pack undergoes rigorous third-party testing to meet industry safety standards”.
What standards are those, and who’s the third party?
I’ve bought and used a wide variety of LFP batteries and the only ones that have failed on me have been Battle Born.
This guy is a hack. Do testing on batteries with jumper cable clips??? Really? Of course terminals will heat up. Also on one of his videos he shows #4 wire being used. Really?? I’ve been working with batteries for over 45 years. This guy is a hack. Needs to RTFM. Don’t get caught up by his click bait.
Of course people are gonna put jumper cable clips on batteries. That’s what they’re for.
The fault is not in the testing, it’s in having plastic spacers that melt and cause connection problems when people do that. It’s a simple design flaw that doesn’t need to be that way.